The Rural Voice, 2004-10, Page 36MY COUSIN,
THE
SQUIRREL
Like a
squirrel, I
seem to have
the habit of
stashing away
treasures,
whether I need
them or not
By Barbara Weiler
As I watch our family of
squirrels attacking the bird
feeder, I am reminded of the
caches of nuts and tulip bulbs I often
find in the garden beds, more
evidence of these frisky inveterate
hoarders.
Then I contemplate once again
attacking my basement and I wonder
if sometime eons ago I had some
kinship with these creatures.
I hope I never need to move!
How would I decide what to keep,
what to discard? I know people who
apparently have no difficulty
shucking off the accumulated debris
of their lives. Perhaps it is there that
the solution lies — move often
enough and the process is less
painful, a continuous metamorphosis,
a shedding of worn out epidermis, a
32 THE RURAL VOICE
reptile abandoning its skin.
A rational analysis of my
proclivity for hoarding might help to
overcome the problem. As the
product of Depression -age parents, I
learned frugality as I learned to talk
and walk. "Waste not, want not," I
am blessed or cursed with "Save it
for a rainy day" thinking. That bit of
string, that pretty wrapping paper,
that blank envelope? Put it in the
junk drawer, it may come in handy
some day. Am I the only one left
who has a junk drawer, that
repository in the kitchen for the
miscellaneous items that rapidly
become a tangled mess and take
forever to sort? Not only is there a
junk drawer, there are junk shelves in
the basement, old alarm clocks,
radios, tangled electrical connections
for who knows what — or whose —
ghetto -blaster or eight -track player.
All I am really sure of is that the
week after I have stealthily assigned
the item to the recycling bin, or
heaven forbid the garbage, the voice
of one of my adult children will ask,
"Mom, whatever happened to my
collection of Mad magazines?" You
guessed it, the condition is
hereditary. Or come to think of it,
perhaps learned behaviour?
In addition to being thrifty and
opposed to waste, I am a hopeless
romantic. I like to keep all those
mementos of life that recall
unforgettable events. I have boxes of
the cards we were sent for our
wedding, birth notices, report cards
for three kids for 13 years, first
poems and stories in wobbly printing,